Various devices and techniques exist to reduce glare from sunlight or other source of bright light. Reducing the glare serves to protect the eyes of a user or otherwise improves the vision of the user when looking through an optical element. For example, users can wear sunglasses, shaded goggles, or other type of shaded eyewear. As another example, some motor vehicles are equipped with rear-view mirrors and/or side-view mirrors that have “dimming” capability to reduce the glare from headlights of other vehicles. In yet other examples, windows in a home might be fitted with shades or curtains to block out sunlight.
However, such devices and techniques are deficient in several ways. For instance, such devices and techniques are generally manual or mechanical in nature that require constant user intervention to make adjustments in the amount of light being allowed to pass through and/or require other user intervention associated with their use. For instance, a user would have to repeatedly take off or put on sunglasses as the lighting conditions change. Similarly with blinds or curtains, the user would have to constantly adjust the openings of the curtains/blinds as lighting conditions change, so as to ensure that a desirable and comfortable amount of light is entering the room. With dimming mirrors in vehicles, the dimming affects the entire surface of the mirror, thereby possibly and undesirably reducing the visibility of other portions of the reflected image (outside of the other cars' headlights). That is, there may be undesirable visual field loss and reduced acuity due to darkening of the entire field of view.